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Breaking into the planet's most popular art institution in the middle of the day, taking eight items of invaluable historical gems and disappearing into the city traffic on simple scooters may seem like the most audacious of crimes, executed for international notoriety and ensuing Hollywood film treatments.

Experts who study trends in international art crime, however, see Sunday morning’s robbery at the Louvre as something more prosaic: the latest in a series of smash-and-grab thefts focused more on the material value of precious stones or metals than the artifacts’ significance, perpetuating a pattern that has appeared over the last decade in Germany, Britain and the US. The location, they suggest, would have been of lesser importance to the thieves.

“You may ask why criminals who want to take valuable jewellery are breaking into a world-famous museum rather than a Cartier store,” stated Christopher A Marinello. “The answer is simple: it’s because nowadays a high-end boutique is more secure.”

A series of aggressive jewellery shop thefts mean that many stores have beefed up their security in the past few years, with security personnel on their locations and wares no longer shown overnight. Cultural institutions, meanwhile, look vulnerable, in part because of the inherent reason of being public-facing institutions in historic buildings, and partly the current economic climate in many developed nations.

“After the pandemic, governments across the world have cut back on law enforcement and the arts funding,” noted Marinello. “If thieves can get into the Louvre, it demonstrates how vulnerable our institutions have become. This is a difficult time to be a museum.”

The robbery of the objects – including jewelry pieces made up of precious stones and 631 diamonds, the crown of a historical figure featuring nearly 2,000 diamonds and a extremely expensive diadem once possessed by a royal that the thieves left by the roadside on their way out – has naturally been compared with the historical theft of the Mona Lisa from the same museum, carried out by the worker the thief.

More relevant points of reference may be the recent theft of valuables from a German institution worth over millions, the taking of a £4.75m gold toilet from Blenheim Palace the same year, the recent heist of a large gold coin from Berlin’s Bode Museum or even a series of robberies of collector items from US mining museums.

“It's a clear trend here,” said Marinello. “Break in, take items, and dismantle them as quickly as possible.”

If the artefacts were to stay whole, experts say, the criminals would find it hard to sell them. “It's impossible to sell something as recognizable as the Louvre’s jewels on the licit market”, said an art crime researcher of the a relevant organization.

“They would be immediately recognised, particularly given the cultural authorities has released images of the items. Even a private collector or an auction house would want to see paperwork establishing proper ownership before handling such remarkable pieces.”

In the previous years, institutions were often hesitant to go public about the disappearance of well-known works of art and would stay silent out of embarrassment. Now, as cultural robberies are more reported on, the keeping and selling of stolen art is risky business for any lawbreaker.

“Taking a Picasso, it has to stay complete or it becomes worthless, and you have to conceive of a scheme to conceal it, maybe by moving it among difficult criminal actors,” said Marinello. “There's ongoing risk to the danger of an accomplice informing authorities to collect a reward.”

For similar reasons, an art detective said it was highly improbable that the robbery had been ordered. “Commissioned theft is something from films,” he said. “Nobody would touch this. It's global news and in all the newspapers. If you acquire these, if you get caught, you go to jail. You can't display it to your friends, you cannot bequeath it to your children.”

Modifying stolen works by dismantling or re-cutting does reduce the value. When it comes to diamonds, it also comes with considerable risk because contemporary cutting techniques give stones a bigger and lighter appearance, and antique-cut stones would either attract notice or barter the price down for a concealment.

Importantly, however, dismantling or re-cutting eliminates the evidence of the crime. “My guess is that the robbers will try to bring the stolen goods to places with gem knowledge like Israel, another nation or even as close as a city, and locate an expert to cut out the stones,” said Marinello.

The robbery at the Louvre has already brought up concerns about protective steps at the institution, with a unauthorized official review expected to be released soon criticising “considerable” and “ongoing” slow progress in modernizing equipment and noting that surveillance were missing in many rooms. But specialists say displaying precious items in older structures with a steady stream of visitors comes with dangers that are impossible to eliminate completely.

“Historic buildings are much harder to protect,” said an art crime professor. “Many of them have nice big street-facing windows that allows for criminals to escape, and there may be building protection statutes in place that mean you are unable to install them with secure windows.”

The most solid protective measures for structures should be conceptualised “like a fortress”, said a security advisor. “It should include several layers to repel attackers.”

Contemporary structures are fitted with state-of-the-art external CCTV cameras or integrated seismic detectors that alert about a broken glass in immediately, but historic institutions may be hesitant to uglify their exteriors. Laser scanners can be hard to install to stuccoed ceilings. Motion and sound detectors may also have to be disabled during the daytime as hordes of visitors walk through a museum.

The timing of the robbery, which occurred between morning hours local time, was common of recent thefts, Stürmann said. “It's logical why robberies tend to happen at either start or end of day. It’s often when guards rotate and prior to the museum is crowded who actually act as additional security staff.”

Technological progress may have thrown up new gadgets that can raise the alarm more rapidly and effectively, but it has also given thieves new tools with which to circumvent protections. In the city, the robbers accessed the museum’s upper level with a mobile equipment and breached a glass pane with a electric tool.

An author said the conversation in the country about the 232-year-old building had primarily centered on crowd control in recent years, and less on protection.

The institution has an on-site brigade of about 50 permanent firefighters, but their purpose is mostly to protect the collection from fires and flooding. “There isn't a rapid-response unit,” Sciolino said. “In the end, the security of the Louvre all depends on government support and money, and at present the nation simply has no resources.”